


smuggler

by stubbleglitter (maggie)



Category: NSYNC
Genre: Dystopia, M/M, Prostitution
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2002-06-23
Updated: 2002-06-23
Packaged: 2017-10-02 21:20:26
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death, Rape/Non-Con, Underage
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,583
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10832
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/maggie/pseuds/stubbleglitter
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>warnings: post-apocalyptic prostitution and black market</p>
    </blockquote>





	smuggler

**Author's Note:**

> warnings: post-apocalyptic prostitution and black market

Everybody's got their little secrets.

In a world like this, people need secrets, Lance thinks. People need to have something for themselves, small and hidden that can be kept safe and never stolen or lost. People need that to remind themselves of who they used to be.

Lance stares out at the constant darkness of the city and is naggingly aware of his reflection in the thick plexiglass of his office window, and his reflection is slightly warped and sheened over with white, and he can't quite remember who he used to be.

He remembers JC, though.

Biting down on the inside of his lip, Lance brings one stiff hand up to tug at the heavy material of his uniform jacket. His reflection starts and shakes and ripples like a painting, and Lance turns away before he thinks about that too much.

...

There are meetings all morning in the Halls, and Lance remains unperturbed through the barrage of Class A Citizens who harangue him over the black market's seeming unstoppability and accuse him of everything from taking bribes from the smugglers to being mentally incompetent.

The shouting and table-banging irritates him at first, but after they've been in the Halls for four hours and the Class A's are starting to wind down, Lance relaxes his ramrod spine and lets himself lounge in his chair. He lets himself look as superior and as bored as he feels, and one by one, the Class As' bombast becomes halting, unfocused, unconvincing. He wears them down by doing nothing at all.

By the time Lance outlines his plans for the systematic tracking and elimination of all avenues for black market goods, the Class A's are so tired and unsure that the medals on his shoulders and the promises on his tongue leave them swollen, sated with the assurance that it will all be taken care of.

They leave in small, predictably politically-biased groups and Lance spends the rest of the day in his office, making telephone calls to the carefully compiled set of Officers who are on what he calls his Orange List. He talks until his throat is dry and scratchy and the weak grey sunlight has given way to charcoal darkness outside. Lance eats three compressed protein bars while he changes out of his uniform, knowing that his stomach will roil painfully later but needing to compensate for a day spent swallowing nothing but coffee, water and bile.

His day isn't quite over yet, though, and by the time he meets Timberlake and Robson in a small Lowtown bar that smells of piss and sweat alchemized into sulphur, it's already tomorrow.

...

Justin grins at Bass when the Officer Customs sits down on a metal-grate chair, face still showing catlike distaste despite its composure. Sitting next to Justin, Wade glares stonily, dark eyes radiating hostile, and Justin's grin widens. He prefers to smile big for the Officials because it makes him seem like he's not worried one bit, and has the added bonus of sometimes even convincing himself that he's not worried one bit. So he gleams all his teeth while he pushes over a sloshy mug of tepid beer, knowing that Bass won't touch it.

"Joey sends his regards," Wade says woodenly, depositing a small flat package wrapped in soft red cotton on the grating of the table. Bass doesn't move to pick it up, just lights a cigarette and regards them levelly with his odd green eyes.

"Then it's set," he says. Justin's sitting closer and it's the only reason he can catch the words in Bass' low register; Wade's face goes blank and Justin knows he's struggling to piece together what it was that Bass said. He turns his grin on Wade, not caring that it's wide with cruel amusement, and replies, "Yeah, it's all good. You're only gonna be seeing us, though. Not Joey."

"Fine by me," Bass says in a plume of acrid smoke. He thumbs the scar that runs over the left side of his bottom lip and fixes his gaze on Justin, pointedly ignoring Wade. "You," he says, voice rolling deep and deliberate, "but not him."

Wade opens his mouth to protest, angry, but Justin cuts him off with a curt nod, still smiling but staring unwavering back at the Officer Customs, his fascinatingly delicate fingers holding the cigarette. "Just me," Justin agrees, and the sound of Wade's hiss shoots hot through his belly. He'll be paying for that indiscretion on his back, later, but the threat isn't enough to make him rescind.

Standing up so fast that the table rattles and slops beer through the grille, Wade pushes the cloth-wrapped package towards Bass. "Open it," he orders roughly. Bass unhurriedly puts his cigarette between his lips and picks up the package. His face is neutral when he unwraps it, perfectly manicured nails bright against the matte of the red cotton, and they make a tiny _kik_ noise on the polished wood case.

The cloth falls to the ground as Justin stands too, but Bass never takes his eyes from the engraved letters on the wood.

...

Justin rubs his arms and hops on his toes as he smokes, wishing he'd thought to put a jacket on over his t-shirt before coming to Wade's room. It's a shirt that is soft and worn and normally he likes the softness but it certainly isn't keeping him very warm. He misses his hair, too, and the warmth of it curling around his ears and against his neck. When he joined, him and Wade, they'd both shaved their heads to look older, more intimidating.

Not that Wade had to work too hard once they were in Joey's set, because he and Joey had figured out that they were distant half-cousins or some shit like that. Since then, Joey's treated Wade like a long-lost baby brother, leaving Justin working twice as hard playing catch-up.

But he's good at what he does, blood relation or not. Damn fucking good.

The door opens and shuts and Justin shivers, but it has nothing to do with the cold mechanical air coming in through the open window. He takes two more quick drags on his cigarette before Wade reaches him to snatch and flick it away, tossing it out the window before bringing the pane down with a bang that echoes the lingering bang of the door.

And then Justin's face is pressed against the dirty glass, streaking it with his breath as Wade wrenches at his pants. "Don't you ever fucking show me up like that again," Wade growls, pausing just long enough to press his cock between Justin's legs, pushing in insistently until his chest is flush against Justin's back. "Not in front of clients, and sure as _fuck_ not in front of the goddamn Officer Customs."

"God," Justin groans as Wade's hips slam his along the windowsill. He can almost remember what it was like when that word meant something to him. He opens his eyes and focuses them enough through the clotted glass to see the people in the window opposite them watching, watching as Wade fucks him against the window, watching every time his mouth drops open in a stuttered moan. Justin unfurls his hands from the fists they're in and smacks them against the window, feeling the wetness seal his skin to cold glass, and he gasps out _god_ a few more times before Wade's done with him and the people in the window are smiling sharply.

...

Later, curled gingerly in his own bed, Justin tries to remember a time when it wasn't like this. It's only because he can't that his chest starts to hitch, and then he smokes cigarettes until he can hardly breathe but at least his eyes are dry.

  


* * *

  
The thing is, the world's always been this way. It's just taken some very poorly mismanaged government munitions and information to bring that to the surface.

Chris can remember a time when the only real concern he'd felt about the arms race was learning its pertinent players for his Political Science midterms. He can remember a time when the sun was yellow, and water was fresh and plentiful, and you figured it would be that way forever. He can remember waking up and looking forward to the day ahead of him, and the way his voice lilted when he sang.

It hurts to think that was all a lie.

"I'm heading down the docks," AJ says at his elbow, and Chris tilts his head in AJ's direction to show that he's listening. AJ likes to be acknowledged. "We've got some flowerpots coming in."

"Flowerpots?" Chris repeats vaguely. "Who the fuck would want those?"

AJ shrugs, standing up and lighting another cigarette. Chris hates the smell of them, some noxious concoction that McLean rolls himself, but he endures it because hating that smell keeps him constantly alert. "Brightside people. The new trend's for gardens, did you hear that?"

"Gardens."

"Yeah. Apparently they're making gardens out of lichens and grass and shit like that."

"You can grow a lot of fucking moss on a flowerpot." Chris turns, finally, and meets AJ's eyes--or at least his shades, which he never takes off. Chris doesn't like looking at the rest of AJ, because there's nothing to see but yards and lashes of ink everywhere, on every inch of exposed skin. That's what AJ does; he doesn't drink, he doesn't fuck--he tattooes himself. Once, Chris let AJ put a tattoo on his shoulder. AJ did it with a steady hand and heavied breathing and Chris felt AJ come in a burning splatter against his back by the end, and that had been the only time and the closest they've come to sex.

Chris doesn't fuck much either, when you get right down to it.

"Hell yeah!" AJ barks laughter, gravelly and flat, the tattoos on his neck stretching along cords and skin.

"What're you hanging around here for, then? Fuck off and get me some flowerpots!" Chris holds out his fist and AJ smacks his down, sliding into a series of palm-slaps that leaves Chris' fingers tingling, even when AJ's already out the door.

Rubbing his forehead, Chris paces to the far window of his penthouse suite and goes out onto the balcony, setting the transparent canopy one sepia shade darker to compensate for the sharp grey of the sunlight. He lights a cigarette, knowing that the canopy's filters will absorb and recycle the smoke into pure oxygen. It's pointless, since he spends so much of his time in Lowtown and Midtown and the dirty polluted streets there have taken an irreversible toll on his lungs, but Chris sets the canopy to filter anyway.

He smokes three cigarettes in a row and savours the burn.

...

Chris Kirkpatrick is the reason that Lance is where he is, there's no denying it. And Lance sees nothing wrong in giving credit--or placing blame, as the case may be--where it is due.

He knows more about Kirkpatrick than anybody else in the city does, and that's still a damnedly small amount of information. To say that the man is elusive and wily would be underselling the case; once the Citizens took over, he wasted no time in establishing himself as the primary supplier of blackmarket goods, brought in from the Canadian Uplands and even shipped overseas from the Eastern Pagoda. Back then Lance had been an ironed new Officer, eager to prove himself and forge ahead in his chosen profession. Back then....

The wooden paintbrush case is pulled across his desk and is underneath his fingertips before he's even aware of it, and the wood is silky and fragrant and Lance can swear it's _warm_, alive, humming, humming. JC was always humming or singing in a wonderful gaspy way under his breath, and once--or twice, Lance thinks maybe it was twice--he actually sang full-out, some old songs that had to do with amazing grace or sons of preacher men. After the second time, JC cut himself off with wracking dry sobs that came from somewhere deep and rusted inside him, and Lance never asked him to sing again.

He sits in his office and traces the initials on the paintbox and wishes that he had.

...

"What was with that wood box, anyway?" Wade asks Joey, who waves a gold-banded hand, pursing his mouth dismissively.

"Nothing for you to worry about, junior," he says with even joviality, and even Wade knows enough not to push. Joey tells things when he wants you to know them and not a moment sooner, and that goes for every aspect of the man--his business, his motivations, **everything**. Justin might work for Joey, and might even have done some very very _wrong_ things for him, but he's never let himself become complacent or even comfortable. He likes living too much to make that mistake.

"Bass seemed pretty cool about the whole thing," he reports. "He's fine with not meeting you, and. Um. He wants me to be the contact."

Joey glances deliberately at Wade, at his darkened face and pulled-together brows, and then smiles at Justin. It's a smile Justin resents, because no smile that sunny and broad should be as fake as it is. He feels cheated every time Joey smiles at him like that.

"He wants you?" Joey says broadly, and Justin works to keep himself from flushing a hot pink, nodding casually over the underlying insinuation of that question. Wade's smirking now, the kind of smirk that would look wonderful plastered across Justin's fist. _To hell with both'a the fuckers,_ he tells himself fiercely, and is surprised to find the familiar burn of anger that's been with him as long as he can remember subside, slide away and freeze over, shooting cooling flickers through his body and up into his brain.

"Yes," Justin says, hearing his voice come out chilled and perfect. "He wants me and _just_ me." He lets it hang and sees the quicktime shift of Joey's eyes, from rough amusement to calculating suspicion without a blink.

"Huh." Joey rolls his head back until his neck cracks and then stands, coming over to Justin and clasping one hand on his shoulder, heavy with unspoken meaning. "Think you're ready for that kind of action, little Juju." It's not a question--only it _is_\--and Justin figures that the best way to answer it is to keep his gaze level with Joey's. Those deep brown eyes search his for a minute or two, then Joey cracks a grin and presses his blunt fingers into the hinge of Justin's arm.

"You'll be the contact man, then," he says as he turns away to sit back down, as good a sign of dismissal as any. "You'll be the face for the Fatones as far as Bass is concerned. Keep him happy, keep me happy--and we'll fuck Kirkpatrick over somethin' good."

And just like that, Joey's revealed the scope of his plan. Not just to set up relations with the Officer Customs, but to finally make his move against the only other big operator in town. _Chris_, Justin realizes, and recalls the taste of fresh bread and the feel of clever fingers, and suddenly wants to throw up.

Instead, he grins at Joey and Wade, and briefly wonders if there's even such a thing as a traitor in this world anymore.

  


* * *

  
_before_

Ever since the wars had broken out, America had become just about the worst place in the world to live. The only reason Justin didn't say that it was for sure was that he'd never been anywhere else, and so he could only assume that there was someplace worse. In the larger scheme of things, it didn't matter what he thought, because he was here and he was here _now_ and that was that.

Things had changed so much and so fast that Justin was barely aware of a time before his life scrapping and scrounging with all the other wounded, salable kids who lived in Lowtown. He was lucky that he was strong and pretty nice to look at and easy to get along with, because it meant that he made friends and tried not to think of them only as allies even though that was what it came down to. It meant that for the most part, he didn't get it too bad...not too _often_, anyways. You never could escape all the time.

Justin had resigned himself to the Low-life, doing what he could to get by, when Chris Kirkpatrick had picked him up.

He was fifteen and wary and in some ways, still bright inside, but he knew who Chris Kirkpatrick was. Everybody in the whole fucking city knew who he was, but they weren't too clear on what he looked like or how old he was or anything like that. Justin didn't realize that he'd been picked up by the black market czar himself until he'd been in Kirkpatrick's penthouse and seen the _stuff_. Stuff that was clean and new and some of it shiny, and Justin knew what some of it was--_mirror, corkscrew, tablecloth_\--but there were lots of things he didn't recognize.

"You hungry?" Kirkpatrick asked him, then said, "Of course you're hungry. C'mere." He took Justin to the kitchen and sat him down, opening a little cupboard that sat on the counter and taking out bread, honest-to-God bread with a brown crust that shattered and crumbled when he sliced into it. Justin stared at the bread as the older man warmed and buttered it, trying not to drool or at least to do it surreptitiously and forced himself not to grab the plate when Kirkpatrick held it out to him.

"You're a smuggler," he garbled through a mouthful of fragrant bread, staring anxiously at Kirkpatrick, and getting ready to bolt, plate and all. For a moment, those clear brown eyes narrowed, then Kirkpatrick laughed, a strange and melodious sound, and leaned on the table.

"Yep," he said. "You're pretty quick for gutter trash." Justin didn't argue and Chris glanced at the refrigeration unit, asking, "So what d'you want to drink?"

"Pizzazz?" Justin tried tentatively. The pink carbonated sugarwater that was cheaper than water or juice or tea was the only thing he could think of, and it relaxed him considerably when Kirkpatrick nonchalantly extracted a bottle of it and set it on the table.

But by then, Justin had finished the slices of bread on his plate and if there was anything he knew, it was how to avoid overstaying one's welcome. He wiped one palm across his mouth and slowly let his tongue follow his fingers, tasting the butter on his lips and letting them fall shinily open. Kirkpatrick watched while Justin stood and came over to him, putting his big coltish hands on Chris' hips and rubbing, promising and plaintive at the same time.

"You," Kirkpatrick said, sliding his hands into Justin's hair but too quickly, more like jabbing. "You. It's not...you remind me. Of something, I can't quite get a hold on-" he halted abruptly as Justin licked his lips again, sinking fluidly to his knees.

What really got to Justin was the _silence_, the quietness of the penthouse all the way up there and no street sounds or yelling or machinery or anything. For the first time he could actually hear the sounds his mouth was making, the noises Chris was making, his own little moans and yelps that he hadn't even really known that he made and at first didn't recognize as his own. He was fascinated and horribly embarassed at the same time and stood up too quickly when it was over, scrubbing at his mouth and shooting glances at Kirkpatrick.

Chris was slumped up against the table, still breathing a little erratically and blinking hard. He took a deep breath and lifted his eyes to meet Justin's, and Justin could tell that he'd be spending the night.

  


* * *

  
Four years ago, and Justin remembers the way to the penthouse like he'd been there the night before.

He stands in the black-stone lobby and stares around at the chrome, the cameras, the stark unfriendliness of it. It smells so different from Lowtown--it has that overly sharp metal-blood smell that all of Commercial does, like money and machines and not-quite-clean. It hurts Justin's nose and he pinches the bridge of it gingerly; while he's scrunching his eyes shut doing that, a man slides up beside him and Justin feels the weighted muzzle of a pistol press against his waist.

"Fuck do you want here?" the man asks, his voice scratchy with menace. Justin slowly lowers his hand from his face and takes a breath, keeping himself from wincing as the edged air knifes through his sinuses.

"I'm here to see Chris," he says. "He doesn't know I'm here, but he'll see me. My name's Justin Timberlake."

The cold round of the pistol presses back and forth against Justin's side like a serpent's head and the man hisses, "Little early in the day for your kind, rentboy."

Justin turns his head enough to look at the man, at his dark glasses and narrow face and all those tattoos, and smiles, letting condescension flood his voice. "He'll see me. Let him know, will you?"

The man's thin eyebrows prick up incredulously before he gives a rasp of a laugh and pulls out a handheld comm, speaking rapidly and quietly into it before tucking it back into his pocket. "Shift your ass, little boy," he says shortly, moving forward to unlock and open the lift. Justin follows him in and they stand in distinct grating silence as the lift shudders upward, up and up and up and Justin is glad that he's too busy acting unfazed to be frightened.

_He remembers me,_ his mind chants with each shift of light from the different levels across his face. _Chris remembers me._

When the lift comes to a halt, Justin closes his eyes and takes a quick breath before the doors slide open. When he raises his eyelids, it's there in front of him--Chris' penthouse suite, just the way he remembered it. Perhaps a little more worn, with time, but otherwise the same.

"Timberlake," the compact, dark figure standing by one of the enormous palely yellow windows says, and Justin has to fight to keep his eyes open, keep from shivering at the sound of Chris' voice, pitched to carry clearly across the room. The tattooed man next to him grunts and pushes him forward with the pistol; Chris doesn't protest or reprimand his man. That's all right--Justin understands the business and the importance of maintaining control in front of one's inferiors.

"We're good, McLean," Chris tells the tattooed man, his gaze trained on Justin. McLean doesn't move, and Chris' dark stare shifts over to him, holding for a few dankly silent moments before McLean mutters a series of imaginative curses and, prodding Justin one final time with the weapon, turns and gets back into the lift.

Chris, blurred under the weak light from the window, regards Justin levelly and his voice is hard when he says, "So. Let's find out what you're here for."

  


* * *

  
_before_

"I'm here for the prints," JC said breathlessly. He found it hard to breathe in the humid, greasy Midtown noodle stand where McLean insisted on meeting him, with its constant smell of broth and close-pressed dirty people. McLean sat unmoved, forking a clump of fat noodles from his bowl and pulling it all into his mouth despite the angry billows of steam rising from the food.

"You still owe for that box of grease crayons--"

"Pastels," JC corrected gently, knowing that McLean would ignore him.

"--and the compact disc player, and those compact discs."

"I know." JC kept himself from wringing his hands and instead pleated his fingers into his long coat to keep them still. His index finger scratched nervously at the side of his thumb as he leaned forward, ignoring the thick smell of McLean's soup. "I know that. But I'll get the money to you, I promise. It just takes a little while to find...the right kind of buyers."

Buyers who would appreciate what they were getting, was what he didn't say. Buyers who actually _wanted_ a Chagall or a movie poster or Mozart sheet music or a U2 album, who actually could love what they were buying and treasure it and maybe resolve to bring artistic merit back to society. JC was very meticulous about who he passed his carefully procured bits of culture to, and he never sold an item unless he felt good about it.

He just didn't feel good very often.

The fingernail scratching his thumb increased speed and pressure as McLean picked up his bowl to drain the broth from it and set it back down with a loud clatter, tikking his tongue against the insides of his teeth and standing up. "You'll get the money to me tomorrow," he said briskly, pulling on his gloves. He bared his teeth in a pointed smile and added, "We'll meet Brightside, behind the seller's market. So you don't get your clothes dirty."

JC nodded numbly as McLean disappeared through the crowd. His thumb was rising pinpricks of pain where his index nail had scratched through the skin and was starting to slick with blood, but JC barely noticed.

\---

Lance didn't normally do things behind people's backs--especially not people he loved. But Lance also didn't like not knowing what was going on. JC had been increasingly nervy lately and refusing to talk about it, refusing to eat much, refusing to do pretty much anything.

So when Lance followed JC into Brightside on that flatly sunny afternoon, he didn't feel too guilty about it.

He suspected it had something to do with all that artsy stuff JC was constantly coming home with. That was one of the few things they disagreed on; Lance, as an Officer, spent most of his days and not a few of his nights tracking down the supply lines for black market goods and shutting them down. JC argued that art should never have become so scarce in the first place that acquiring it should force one to resort to illegal means.

JC was a very persuasive man when he set his mind to it, and when he demonstrated one of the ways in which art was beneficial by painting broad swoops of henna-colored dye onto his and Lance's skin, making them decorated and sweet-smelling for days afterward, Lance couldn't help but acquiesce...at least, for the time being. He figured that there would be ample opportunity to wean JC off of his ill-gotten goods, show him that there was no excuse for disregard of the law. But whenever Lance hinted at it, JC would hum and stroke knowing fingers along the monogrammed painbox that he kept his prized brushes in, and Lance would indulgently let it slip one more time.

Which meant that Lance wasn't overly surprised when he climbed one of the catwalks over the seller's market to overlook the alley below and found that JC was meeting a smuggler in the trade. What he was surprised about was that it was a member of the rapidly strengthening Kirkpatrick cartel, the biggest black market dealers in the city. Later, he would be surprised by just how _much_ money JC owed and in how short a time he had accrued such debt.

Right now, in a calm, unfeeling part of his mind, he was only surprised at how beautiful it was when the whiplike, tattooed man--McLean, he knew him from the files--spoke to JC for a few moments before gesturing for JC to preceed him into one of the back doors. How unusually sharp every color, every move was as JC turned and began walking and Lance's heart gripped at the paleness of JC's face, and then McLean's arm was reaching around JC.

And there was a sheet of blood spilling from the wide dark gaping wound where JC's throat had been whole the moment before.

And there was a pattering thick scatter of it as JC fell forward, silently, and the blood hit the ground before he did with his long tan coat flagging behind him, and Lance swallowed the cry that was swelling through his throat because all he could do was draw attention to himself by yelling, and JC was already _dead_, so quickly, that was his _corpse_ lying there in the alley with that widening viscous pool of red-shining black around it...

...and that was the last thing Lance remembered.

He was an Officer, though, and so when the Brightsiders found him unconscious on the catwalk they took him to a Class care facility, where he was treated for pollution fatigue and released within an hour, cleaned and rehydrated and with vitamin shots building strength in his system.

JC's body had already been removed by the time he got back to the market. There wasn't even a stain where he'd been; the Brightsiders, Lance thought dully as he stared down at the spot where he thought he remembered JC lying, didn't tolerate dirtiness and death in their part of town. JC would have loved it there, really.

Lance went back to his flat alone and never looked back at the chimney of the Citizen Reclamation facility, that day or any day following. He was too afraid of what he might see, in the greasy crematory smoke rising appallingly from its smokestack, and he was afraid that he would never see anything.

  


* * *

  
"I'm not in the mood, Timberlake-"

"That's not what I'm here for."

"No? Then what's the deal? You looking for a good price on something, huh? Maybe some whiskey and a decent steak, or a shaving mirror, or some uppers, you like those? Got a new bunch in from the Eastern, they're really wild. Make you so blissed out you wouldn't notice if I took needle-nosed pliers to your eyeballs."

"I'm not looking for anything like that, Chris."

The name pulls him up short, because _nobody_ calls him "Chris" anymore. It's Kirkpatrick, all the time, from the people he makes deals with and the people who are terrified of him, from everybody. Chris. It sounds strange to him, but it had sounded natural and almost fond coming from Timberlake's mouth. Familiar.

The thought of that makes anxiety bubble in his stomach and he steps further into the room, away from the god-awful windows, so high up. Penthouses--they're the fucking best, but their major flaw was the _height_.

Timberlake watches him calmly, and Chris considers for a moment what this kid would be like on the job. McLean had obviously seen something dangerous, some inner reserve of steel and magma, or he wouldn't even have bothered taking out his pistol. "Sit," he says, and watches Timberlake do it without a moment of hesitation. It's been a long, stony time since Chris did anything without hesitation. It hurts to see it and it hurts even more to realize it.

"You came here on business," he snaps. "So what's your business?"

The kid actually smiles at him, and Chris can't hold back an incredulous laugh. Undaunted, Timberlake spreads his hands and says, "Just scoping my options, Chris. I'm looking for...something, but not something to buy."

"You want to work for me?" Chris says, feeling a strange swelling in his throat. He isn't sure what it is until Timberlake rolls his eyes up exaggeratedly, dismissively, and the lump dissolves into relief despite the slight irritation at being treated so familiarly.

"No," Timberlake says, reaching out to brush his fingertips along the back of Chris' hand before putting his big hand back on his knee. "No. I just wanted...to...to see it. You. Again."

"McLean would have killed you," Chris says flatly. "He would have shot you through the head if I hadn't remembered who you were."

"You did, though. Remember," he smiles, and when Chris, exasperated and suddenly exhausted, says, "Timberlake--" the kid murmurs, "I'm Justin."

"You're Justin," Chris repeats, and the name melts on his tongue.

...

"He's just some fucking whore," McLean says, later, and Chris doesn't rebuke him because it's the truth, after all, and the whole reason he took McLean on was because he wanted somebody who would tell him the unflinching truth. "He's some Low trash who sold you his ass once and thinks you'll take him on permanent now. You can't trust him, Kirkpatrick. These junkie sluts'll do anything for a bit of money."

"It's all under control," Chris tells him. McLean eyes him and rasps, "You like him, you dumb fuck."

Chris shakes his head and McLean bites down on his foul-smelling cigarette, teeth small and sharp like a volley of snakebites. "Let me have a crack at him, then. It's been a long time since I fucked a pretty face like that. I bet he bleeds real nice."

The point's made. Chris can feel the angry pull around the corners of his eyes and he knows McLean sees it, because the other man leans in close and growls, "Be very fucking careful, Kirkpatrick. I ain't going down for some guttertrash piece of ass."

"I hear you," Chris says calmly. He can feel the bright spot of heat throbbing on his face from McLean's close-by cigarette even when it's gone and McLean's gone and the lift is in motion, falling through the building until it reaches the ground.

  


* * *

  
"You've been negotiating with the Officer Customs for three months now," Joey says in-between bites of food. Justin nods, spinning his glass of whiskey around and around on the table, watching the harsh spirits coating the insides with each circuit.

"And it's been going well," Joey prompts, chewing energetically before wiping his mouth. He lights a cigarette even before he swallows and Justin looks down, willing the churning in his stomach to stop. He puts the glass to his lips and drinks it all, dropping the burning fumes on top of the roiling feeling. When he looks up, Joey is staring at him, dark eyes inscrutable.

Justin opens his mouth and holds back a wince when his voice comes out croaky. "Bass has been letting us get away with all the Pagoda shipments," he says, knowing that Joey knows this already but expects him to revise the progress. "He's been concentrating cracking down on Kirkpatrick and only hits us on small shipments from the Canadian Uplands--comm parts, dried food, no-account shit like that."

Joey nods and raises one hand. His thick golden rings gleam dully as he gestures and Wade comes over to stand next to him, attending him like an heir apparent. "I think," Joey begins, and Justin feels the alcohol permeate his belly, spread outward and upward and crawl up his throat, fumes rising into his nose. "I think it's time to make a move. There's been enough of this dicking around, Justin. You're going to take down Kirkpatrick's Midtown warehouse."

Thin caustic bile shoots up against Justin's tonsils, and his mouth works furiously before he says, "A raid. And I'm leading it?"

"Yeah." Joey purses his mouth consideringly. "I think it's time. And Wade thinks you'd be perfect to front." Justin looks at Wade, then, and the smugness smeared over his face, and with sick certainty he thinks, _they know, they know they know they motherfucking **know**_ and so he looks from one to the other, and nods. Because there's nothing else for him to do, and they all three of them know it.

"Good. Now you two fuck off and do whatever it is you do." Joey pats Wade's arm and waves him benificently over, and Wade's face is twisted with triumph and cruelty, and Justin knows what comes next.

...

He's doubled over a ramp railing behind a warehouse and it's jarring and halfway through he vomits hard, but Wade doesn't seem to care and Justin grinds his raw, aching teeth against the pain.

...

The Orange List is diminishing, and Lance feels like he's falling deep, deep down.

Ever since he got into bed with Fatone he's been losing Officers, left and right. A few are killed, a few disappear--but most of them he's forced to drop, because they were good men when he knew them and they wouldn't understand what he's doing now.

You have to make sacrifices to get ahead, he tells himself at night when he takes sleeping pills even though they make him wake up drained and soaked in sweat. His skin looks pouchy and baggy, his eyes look like they're softly rotting from the inside out. But that's one of the sacrifices he's making. Because Kirkpatrick--Kirkpatrick is the one, the one he has to take down, the one who he's doing all this to stop.

You can deal with Fatone after, he tells his reflection when he scrubs his teeth clean of the night's black steelwool clogging, gagging on the gritty toothpowder and spitting again and again into the sink. One morning he sees blood swirling pink among the frail white foam and grit, and he forces himself to keep brushing and by the time he's done his gums are scraped open and he tastes blood all day.

You can build the Orange List back up once you've dealt with Kirkpatrick, he tells himself when the Class A's congratulate him on the staged arranged busts of Fatone's cartel and they pretend they don't see the haggard and wasted mess he's become. But the Officers who used to be on the list, who he trusted to obey the law and to enforce the Citizens' tariffs and taxes--they're outside of his circle of orbit now, and their faces are no longer familiar from where he is.

Lance doesn't hear humming from JC's paintbox anymore. It's fallen silent, just like everything else around him.

...

"I need to tell you something," Justin says, and he's gulping and blinking and Chris grabs him and shakes him before pushing him down onto the couch.

"Get a hold of yourself," he orders, and he's not sure who he's talking to because that was the first time he's touched Justin in the three months they've been doing...this, and his fingers feel seared where Justin's skin was warm beneath them. Chris is almost certain that if he looks at them, his fingerprints will have fused into smooth, unridged skin.

"It's okay," Chris says, although it isn't okay at all and Justin obviously doesn't believe him, because he's shaking his head desperately, trying to work up enough stamina to say whateverthehell is was he came to confess.

"I need," Justin begins again, hopping slightly on the couch, but he cuts himself off and lifts enormous dark eyes and Chris suddenly doesn't want to hear it, he doesn't want to hear a goddamned thing from this boy's bruised mouth unless they're moans and his name, and he puts one hand to Justin's burning forehead, one strong move, slams him back on the couch. Justin makes a small startled noise when the back of his shorn head slaps the leather cushions and then he freezes, and their panting is the only sound in the penthouse, and they both remember the taste of butter.

Chris slants his body heavily over Justin's and kisses him, tastes the slick inside of his upper lip and then bites at him, wanting more. Underneath him, Justin is tensed and hard until Chris' tongue skates over the roof of his mouth, and then he's abruptly in motion, wrapping his long arms under Chris' arms to hook over his shoulders and pulling him down, moaning and sobbing and murmuring his name.

They tumble to the floor and Justin scrabbles his heels against the black-and-white tile to get his knees up, and their clothes are open already, tugged apart here and there and wherever's necessary. "Chris," Justin growls through his teeth, urgent and feral and demanding, eyes narrowing under his level brows as he grinds his hips against Chris'.

"Justin," Chris says back, and the sound of it in his mouth makes him shudder the way Justin is shuddering under his hands, so he puts one hand under one of Justin's thighs and shoves his leg up before thrusting into him. They both go still for a moment and Justin makes a ragged noise that slides into a throaty cry as he presses his ankles into the small of Chris' back, hauling him in deeper.

Gasping, Chris moves his hands up to sprawl over Justin's sides, feel the ribs under his fingers slatting the skin tightly then falling away in time with Justin's panting. His blue eyes are open, wide, staring up at the penthouse ceiling as Chris fucks him ravenously and strange, inhuman noises tear from both of their throats and strained flushed mouths.

For a moment within all the sensation, Justin's eyes focus and he looks at Chris, scans his face and his mouth trembles, and Chris knows what he's feeling. He even saw it coming, a little bit, but that doesn't make it hit him any less hard, and the only thing that really alarms him is that he's the one to actually say _i love you_.

...

He doesn't tell Chris about the raid.

Instead, he sleeps the night with his body cooling and sticking and breathing next to Chris, safe in the penthouse apartment that Chris hates and Justin loves, sleeping the best he ever has.

He's not sure if he can make this better, but at least they'll have had one night.

The light that bars across Justin's face as he goes down the lift seems different than it had when he'd been going up, like it's the rough unfinished side that's scraping lines over his skin with each floor he passes. He closes his eyes and imagines it branding him like a code, stripes burned into his flesh, so vivid he can almost smell it.

The black stone of the lobby and the blood-and-money smell seem almost pleasant now, because they're part of Chris and Justin wants to love everything to do with Chris, because he's never loved anything wholly in his life and this seems like a good goddamn opportunity for it. He doesn't want to give up without a fight.

When he steps out of the building, Wade is waiting for him.

...

"Did you finally fuck him?" McLean asks, his thin lips spitting the words out like they're marbles. Sitting in the kitchen drinking too-strong, burning coffee, Chris rubs his forehead and shifts so he can feel the soreness of his body, the marks of Justin on his flesh.

"Maybe," Chris murmurs. AJ--it's too early in the morning to think of him any other way--AJ comes over and leans across the high table, pleating his fingers together on the wood between him and Chris, and grates, "That's good. I hope you rode his ass for hours and hours, man, because I hope you got your money's worth."

"What the fuck are you going on about?" Chris snaps, letting his hands stay on the heated sides of his cup too long, until they start to tingle and smart. His overheated hands still smell like Justin and he keeps them there even longer.

AJ takes off his shades, and his eyes are tar-black, small, and corrosively puckered around the edges, spiderwebs of poorly-healed skin that net each one. They crinkle and seam as he speaks. "He was talking to one of Fatone's crew down Midtown this morning," he says, deliberately speaking slowly and clearly. "Robson. Fucking _Robson_, Kirkpatrick. He was telling Robson how you tricked you into fucking him, how he's pulled the fucking wool over your eyes, how he's gonna be leading a raid on Warehouse Midtown tonight."

Chris stares at AJ's fingers and notices that the tips are stained black, and wonders just what's in those noxious cigarettes the man smokes. He wonders why AJ would lie to him, but then, AJ has never lied to him and probably never would.

Which means that he's right about Timberlake.

The thick, bitter smell of the coffee rises and Chris feels his insides searing away.

  


* * *

  
It ends the only way that a story like this can end, in mud and pain and blood. Happy endings are hard to come by, and are portioned out meanly by the gods; sometimes, dying well is the most you can hope for.

  


* * *

  
The Customs vehicles are uncomfortable for a reason--they're designed to keep an Officer alert and awake while he's on patrol. They're certainly doing that for Lance, who feels like he's been waiting half the night, watching Kirkpatrick's Midtown warehouse. But that's part of the job, he knows. It's not as if he could be at home sleeping, after all.

His stomach churns indignantly and Lance digs out two meal supplement pills and swallows them dry, wincing at the lumpy swath they scratch down his throat. Food has been low on his list of priorities for as long as he can remember, but like the forced and drugged sleep, nutrition is necessary for him to perform his job. It's really the least of his worries, he thinks as he notices Robson and a range of Fatone's men picking up entry points around the warehouse. He sees Timberlake confer briefly with Robson, then stride across the street to one of the taller buildings overlooking the warehouse. Timberlake has a scoper rifle with him and Lance makes a note to himself, updating his mental files to include the fact that Timberlake has sniper skills.

What makes him lean forward, though, throat lurching so hard that he can almost feel the supplement pills coming back up, is the tall man who's walking behind Robson, walking behind him the way a king is preceeded by his jester. Lance knows who that is, even though they've met only once, a long time ago. The scar on Lance's lip feels tight and itchy and he has to keep himself from hissing Joey's name.

...

Chris can't keep from grinning ruefully when he spots the Officer Customs' car, and he knows that signals the existence of a fleet of similar Customs vehicles somewhere very, very nearby, ready to be called into action to bring righteous justice on the evildoers. In fact, what with Bass _and_ Fatone showing up, this is turning out to be something more than what he'd expected--perhaps more than any of them had expected.

He slams a reload cartridge into his loaded pistol and keeps it primed, thrumming warm and silent in his hand. There's going to be hellfire raining down on Midtown tonight, and Chris doesn't want to be caught in the middle if he can help it.

...

When the shooting starts, it starts from inside the warehouse and lights up the entire area for one brief, beautiful second before everything falls into darkness and bullets melt through the galvanized steel of the warehouse walls, pelting like deadly stars out into the night and into the men gathered around it. Kirkpatrick's men and Fatone's men meet like smashing waves, the bowstring sound of their pistols running high over the more gutteral sounds of flesh tearing and entrails ripping.

Tensed in his vehicle, Lance swallows and swallows, throat dry, and tells himself that letting the two factions kill each other off before he calls in his men is practical and reasonable and logical. And it is, it is. But there are still knots tying themselves in his esophagus and he gets out of his vehicle, and he's trotting loping breaking into a run while he calls in the backup.

He's failed, he's failed already and again because he hasn't seen Kirkpatrick yet, and there's something in his gut stronger than anything he's ever felt telling him that Kirkpatrick will never be punished. Lance doesn't want to believe it, but it's getting harder to deny things, now, and he can't see Kirkpatrick anywhere.

But he can see Fatone.

...

And it's the dirtiest kind of kill, because Fatone's reloading his doublepistol and never even sees Lance. It's just a squeeze on the trigger and Fatone's down, dead, a neat clean shot right between the shoulderblades and Lance knows there's blood soaking Fatone's dark coat because he can smell it even over the hot magnesium stench of the bullets and the steel.

And there it is--he's just killed a man. In the line of duty, in defense of the law. As part of his job. And not even the man he really **wanted** to kill.

The sound of the Customs sirens yowls, cutting shrilly through even the shots and the cries, and Lance is tired, tired, tired. The pistol is heavy in his hand and there are Fatone men and Kirkpatrick men all around him, and he hears Robson give a shout of dismay and knows he's been spotted. The Customs sirens are bearing down, circling his brain, beating on his eardrums.

"Is Kirkpatrick dead?" Lance rasps, quietly. Nobody answers him, because nobody can hear over the cacophany of yells and screeches and pistolshot, and Lance finds this unbearably sad, and his Orange List is gone and he'll never get it back, and the Class A's will tear him to pieces like dogs over a dead cat.

Robson has just reached him when Lance presses the muzzle of his regulation-issue pistol underneath his chin, and is mildly surprised at its warmth and its humming before he pulls the trigger.

  


* * *

  
McLean makes it out, and after five months recuperating and regrouping, he begins a blackmarket trade of his own. There's a new Officer Customs, one who operates without the moralistic baggage of Orange Lists or governmental scruple, and she and McLean manage to flood Midtown and Lowtown and especially Brightside with all the contraband they could want. After the bodies were cleared away in the weeks following the Midtown warehouse raid, alliances shuffled and settled and are now strongly bolstering the new economic ceasar, the old and dead forgotten quickly. The Class A's rant and rail against the smuggling, but there's a shift of power happening and they can all feel it.

McLean's operation is the only one in the city, and it's involved in _everything_.

  


* * *

  
"We deserve to be dead, you know," Chris says, softly against Justin's nascent curls. Justin arches up against him, warm and solid against Chris' chest.

"No, we don't," he says firmly. "We played our percentages right and got out just before everybody got killed. Would you feel better if our bodies got tossed into the Citizen Reclamation with all those other fucks?"

Chris bites at Justin's hair, thrilling at the shock it sends through his teeth. "We got a lot of people killed."

Justin twists to look at him, eyes faceted in the canary-hot Pagoda sunlight. "Yeah," he says. "We did." His mouth skews to one side and Chris is reminded of that night, the sleetstorm of bullets, the shriek of sirens, the feel of Justin running next to him as they deserted everything they'd both ever known and left the men they'd worked with to kill each other and to die, the sound of Justin's panted _you trusted me_ sounding like _i love you_ as they ran and ran and ran.

"Fuck them, anyway," Chris grins, and Justin's laugh is warm and yellow-soft like butter.


End file.
